And There She Was
by SecretFruits
Summary: A lonely, angry man deals with loneliness and anger. A character study of Argus Filch, and how a friendship came to be. For Tiggs.


For Tiggs. Hope you enjoy it. Remembered you talking about Filch over in the Gryffindor common room and felt inspired to write this for you.

 **Prompts are at the bottom so as not to give any spoilers.**

* * *

Argus scrubbed at the stone tiles, the grey rag in his hand so worn it was nearly transparent. And there he was. Finally seeing the inside of Hogwarts, and he was seeing its _filth._

Unsurprising, really. On the outside he'd seen its filth, too. His halfblood parents, so _proud_ of their precious _magic_ when even the Leaky Cauldron wouldn't hire them. His sister, the Hufflepuff who'd apparently shagged every boy in her year and then ran away with some _farmer_. His brother, the Slytherin who even Crabbes and Puceys turned their noses up at.

And yet he _,_ Argus, was the unworthy one.

The one unworthy of magic.

He swept the rag again and again, and he wanted to be worthy. He wanted it more than anything in the world, and the more he wanted it, the less he was.

Nothing had ever thought him worth much anyway. For a moment he closed his eyes and dreamed - of a companion, maybe. Something that loved him.

* * *

On the first evening, he sat beside Albus at the staff table. In what, he later understood, was Minerva's spot - the spot of the Headmaster's right hand, of the women who was probably his only friend.

For a few glorious moments, Argus surveyed the school and felt it was _his._ He was here, at Hogwarts, a fabric of this place, essential to it. He was here, at Hogwarts, in a seat his siblings would have killed for. He was here. At Hogwarts. Eating the greatest meal of his life.

But the feast was infected with magic.

The food appeared instantaneously, shoved into greedy mouths with rule breaking displays of wand work. He watched those displays and felt anger, a throbbing anger which turned his pumpkin juice sour. The candles brightened by themselves as the evening went on, denying him even the luxury of blindness.

Pomona smiled beside him, trying and failing to engage him in conversation.

No, he hadn't ever grown plants - no, he wouldn't like to visit her stupid magic garden.

No, he didn't listen to the Charmed Chamberwitches. No, he hated sports. No, he hadn't been up to the Astronomy Tower yet. No, he didn't have a pet - where would he buy one? Diagon Alley?

As a boy, he would wave a twig and pretend it was a wand and cry. Even then, he had never felt this lonely. And the ceiling looked like rain.

At Hogwarts, even the ceilings were cruel.

* * *

Despite what the slimy brats thought, he didn't actually dislike cleaning.

He dipped the mop in the hot, soapy water. As he pulled it out, small bubbles stuck to the light blue foam.

He ran it across the grey steps, and they shone as the sunlight hit them. The bubbles glistened, and then popped.

No, Argus Filch didn't dislike cleaning. There was a certain beauty to a job well done, some sort of shimmering _magic_ in that polished walkway.

"MULCIBER!"

A girl and boy, both with green and silver scarves undone and uniforms unclasped, were chasing each other across the grass. A cloud of dust trailed around them, like kindling for Argus's anger. It turned to mud at his feet, because nothing, and especially not those steps, shimmered for long around him.

"SPREWSHIRE! MULCIBER!" Letting his mop fall with a thud, he strode over to the cheeky youngsters. "Let's see….running through the hallways...out of uniform...oh my, are we in trouble…"

* * *

Sometimes, long after dark, he would walk around the lake. His brother and sister had filled their letters with it - stories of snowball fights along its shores, of skipping rocks into its depths…

A silver stone, worn smooth, found its way into his hand. He pulled his arm back, then flicked sharply, sending it soaring. It made a sound more like a plop than a splash and, to his shock, bounced twice on the water.

Then Argus jumped. Something soft brushed against him, soft and warm. But by the time he'd lit his lamp, it was nowhere to be found.

* * *

He started the day outside the Gryffindor Common Room, rubbing varnish in front of the portrait hole. Hundreds of feet had pounded the wood there raw.

"I could _help you_ with that, sir!"

Argus surveyed the creature in front of him. She had untidy hair and freckles. "You could _what?"_

"I know some charms! It's really much simpler with charms! _I -"_

Dropping down to her level, he grabbed her by the shoulder. Terrified, her mouth snapped shut, but she held his gaze. Any pity she'd felt had fled her eyes.

"I am _capable_ of doing my job and I don't need your _pity._ Any extra _work_ you see me doing is due to _foul cretins_ like you running around _mucking up the castle!"_ With that last phrase he released her, and was pleased when she tripped backwards. "Now if you _dare_ tell me how to run this castle again, I will have you out." He stood over her tiny form, laughing as she trembled. "Mark. My. Words."

Loneliness was better than guilt, but anger was better than both of them.

* * *

That night, as he walked along the lake, a pair of lamp-like eyes followed him. He saw them in the shadows, so distant he felt he might have imagined them.

He walked towards them, but they never drew closer. He cursed at them, convinced they were some pathetic trick or freakish joke or _whatever those children have come up with now,_ but they remained. Watching him.

Watching him.

Why did he think they were watching him?

Why did he think they would care? Why, after all this time?

He was forever doomed to walk around that lake alone.

Fear was better than hope, anyway.

* * *

"A flash of temper looms large in the mind of a child." Albus stuck a blue and white bowl in Argus's direction. "Lemon drop?"

Glaring at the collection of sweets, Argus shook his head. Albus's seemingly genial expression didn't falter.

"I cannot allow you to manhandle my students."

Albus wouldn't sack him, he knew. Not oh-so-righteous Albus. Not oh-so-righteous Albus, who he'd somehow come to like, and whose righteousness was the only righteousness Argus could stand.

Not oh-so-righteous Albus, who beneath his twinkling eyes and candy and irritatingpet bird was clearly furious.

Argus nodded.

"And their emotional well-being is _not_ something I take... _lightly,_ Argus." To so many, this might have seemed like an understatement. But Argus heard it for what it was.

A threat.

A reminder that, despite Albus's kindnesses, those blasted magical children came first and he was not anything close to second. That, ultimately, he was one of many projects.

* * *

He did not _truly_ want to hurt the children, so he scowled and shouted in part to keep them away. And as months flew by, even the House Elves, who practically _craved_ abuse, avoided him.

He thought of the castle, which had somehow become the only home he'd ever known. And he felt cold.

When he felt cold, he would pull out his mop. He'd dip it in the warm, soapy water. And when the patch of floor he had descended upon was shiny and new, he'd think how the mop was a wand, and he was doing magic.

* * *

He spent Christmas at the school.

A few of the messy brats were still around, delighted by the crackers and enchanted tree and horseless sleigh rides. Argus wasn't sure how only five children could track so much slush around the castle, but it gave him an excuse to hate the snow.

But it wasn't _those_ children that he hated most. He hated the ones who had left, returning to a warm home and a family Christmas. Probably a tree, with enchanted ornaments. Maybe a new broomstick - sometimes Argus swept the floor with those, just to touch them. Mopping and sweeping. Wands and broomsticks.

A thrice-daily reminder of all he had lost as a child - all that he had lost in his _life,_ which he knew he could never, _ever_ get back - was far from what Argus wanted, so he had quickly stopped eating at the staff table. He had no intention of making that Christmas an exception, so he left the castle before the sun set. Instead he walked to Hogsmeade for the first time.

He'd worked at a Muggle restaurant, once. The dishwasher had tacked a picture above the sink, of a boy in a gingerbread house sitting on the lap of a bearded man in red. He hadn't thought of that picture in years - but, walking down the snow covered cobbled streets, he remembered that boy's smile. His _Muggle_ smile.

* * *

"And how has your first year here been?"

Argus thought her name was Pince. He hadn't spoken a word to anyone in almost a week.

He didn't answer her. Grunting, he continued polishing the door handle.

She opened her mouth, seemed to change her mind, and walked away. With something like longing, Argus remembered those eyes watching him walk the lake.

* * *

Without wood or magic he couldn't light the fire, and Scottish winters were _cold._

He placed a pillow at his feet, but that couldn't thaw the numbness between his toes. He wrapped the pillow in a blanket and draped himself in another one, but air still somehow found its way through his robes. Finally he shouted for Tidgy, who bowed so much he thought her freakily long elf ears would fall off. His voice was hoarse from lack of use.

But the next morning there was soot on the mantle, and that he wiped off himself.

The next evening flames started crackling the moment he entered his bedchamber. With something like disappointment, he realized he'd have no reason to speak to Tidgy that night. He patted the pillow, and then he stroked it, and then he realized he was mad.

* * *

It was midsummer when he finally met her. She was curled up by the owlery.

He swatted her with his mop. "Git!"

She just stared up at him through golden-brown eyes. Preparing to poke her, he swung his mop and drenched himself in water.

"TIDGY!"

It was more than he had spoken all month.

* * *

"Twenty months, now?"

Albus peered at him over half-moon spectacles, eyes twinkling infuriatingly. Giving no response, Argus broke eye contact.

"Lemon drop?"

Argus didn't even bother to shake his head. At least _this time_ they weren't in Albus's infernal office. How he hated that wretched pigeon.

And then he saw her. She pranced up to their table before, to Argus's _disgust,_ curling up at his feet and purring.

He bent his knee backwards, preparing to kick her, when he saw the corners of Albus's mouth twitch. "She's part kneazle, you know."

* * *

He saw her the next morning, as he trimmed the hedges by that _oaf Hagrid_ 's hut. She was watching him from the branches of an alder tree, ears perked upward. She was an earthy brown color, but with pleasant specs of white and black.

She was... _pretty!_

"So you're a kneazle, huh."

Her bushy brown tail moved slightly, and a few leaves moved with it.

"Makes sense you'd be more magic trick rubbish." Like everything here. What had he expected, really?

No response. Argus put down his sheers and looked between the branches of her tree. The castle was clearly visible. It was his home, he supposed, if not a very good one. He did what he could for it. To keep it nice.

And then he thought of that day in the snow, so long ago. He remembered lifting his boots and looking around Hogsmeade village, the loneliness inside him rendering him almost numb to the cold. The feeling of abandonment, that the only time he'd ever seen that famed town it was deserted.

 _Deserted._

Just like the magical world had deserted him - worse, it had never been there; _squib_ was a made up word; he was a Muggle, plain and simple, and there was no magic in the world that would _ever_ touch his life.

But he lowered his gaze slightly, and there she was.

Something magical. And she'd chosen _him_.

* * *

Author's Notes...

 **Prompts Used:**

One Prompt Challenge - Person getting a pet for the first time

The Houses Competition Year Two Round Two - Year 1, Gryffindor, Themed (Jealousy), Prompt: (Creature) Kneazle

Word Count: 2019 (story only)

Any and all feedback is lovely! Thanks for reading.


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